alesco -ere [to grow up].
Act II, Scene Five: Alesco: An end to childhood.
The beach was deserted save the young woman who seemed so far away. Ava let her Key slip back into her heart and adjusted her hair and clothes. "Riku, there's someone over there."
Riku scrambled up and dusted himself off. He took his pale fingers quickly through his disheveled silver locks and felt for the satchel at his hip. He pulled at his clothes; this place was humid, making his present outfit impractical.
"Do you know where we are?" Ava whispered, pushing back the branches and guiding Riku into the open.
"I guess it's another step on our way to the Door…" He jerked his head up suddenly.
"Hmm? Something the matter?"
"I just heard seagulls. This is the ocean…like where I grew up."
"It's pretty," she said, gazing around. It seemed that it wasn't quite sunrise yet, the air quiet in its wait for morning. "There's just that girl. Let's go."
"A girl?" wondered Riku, tripping a little as his companion sped up across the beach.
Avarielle eventually slowed down at the same point where the sands became wet and malleable.
He heard a light gasp.
"Excuse me, there!" Ava called.
Before Riku knew it, thin arms were choking him and tears were staining his chest.
"Riku!" cried a light female voice. Somewhere inside those new sounds was buried a familiar inflection.
He was tasting hair and smelling light, flowery perfume. His hand slipped down to the waist of a thin shirt, something practical for island life.
The woman slipped out of his grasp, sniffling slightly. Some of her long hair was still caught on Riku and it slipped over him as she stepped away.
"Riku, don't you recognize me?" she wanted to know. "I guess I've changed, but…"
He didn't want to guess and be wrong. He didn't want his hopes to come against a brick wall and throw him down.
"Oh—Oh nooo…!" said the girl, shock and despair flooding into her words. "Riku! What's happened to you?"
"I'm sorry… I truly wish I could see you."
"I guess that explains it," she murmured, recovering a little. "Riku, you've finally come home. It's me, Riku. It's Kairi."
"I'm home…" He was home, and he hadn't even known it.
Riku laughed bitterly.
The three young adults walked across the beach slowly. Their shoes and bags were in a pile under the trees, along with Riku's long-sleeved undershirt (it was getting far too hot as the sun came up).
"Is it sunrise yet?" Riku asked.
"Almost," Kairi replied.
"Okay, Ava, I want you to watch."
Riku envisioned the sight while Avarielle reacted to the majesty of a tropical sun coming up over an enormous blue sea, a place where nothing was there to block one ray of the golden rays. Riku's brain filled in the details of the waves of color moving across the water and the sky itself. He smiled.
"It's so lovely! Just like you told me, Riku! It's even more beautiful than you said!" She'd been holding his arm gently up until now as she guided him down the beach, but now her fingers slipped down to his hand and she squeezed it in delight.
Riku wished he could have seen her reaction, but at least he had the memory from Comptium still fixed in his mind. Right now he would have liked more to know what Kairi was doing.
"What? Oh, excuse me. I was just thinking." Her voice came back from somewhere very far away. With a light sigh, the woman admitted, "I haven't really stopped to notice the sun for a long time now… It is pretty."
Ava's fingers slipped from Riku's and she yawned audibly. "Excuse me, Miss Kairi, but I'm feeling a little tired. Is there anywhere for me to rest?"
"Oh, of course," Kairi said. "I'll show you back to my house."
"I'll just rest here for a while," Riku told the girls and soon he heard them jogging across the sand. The man rolled up his pants past the knees and fell back onto the beach. His toes scraped the water while he put both hands behind his head. He closed his already sightless eyes and just listened.
He heard the wide, sweeping waves, the cawing of the seagulls and other tropical birds. He smelled the salt and the earthy scent of trees and even the drifting aroma of food; someone was cooking on the other side of the island. The breeze played with his hair and loose clothing while the sun began to beat down on his exposed skin. The sand felt warm and good beneath him.
I'm home, he thought pleasantly, and he came very close to falling asleep.
"Hey, you," came Kairi's now recognizable voice from above the snoozing man. He heard her plop down next to him, most likely cross-legged, as she was known to sit.
He felt her hand scraping his cheek. "You okay?"
"Sort of," he told her.
She let her hand pull back, but hesitantly. "How long…?"
"Maybe a week."
"Just that long?!"
"A lot has happened."
"I can tell…" Her voice held the echoes of laughter, but there was no amusement in it. Suddenly, she was closer to him and grabbing his hand. "Riku, are you going to stay—?"
"I don't know. I would really like to."
"Then why don't you?"
"I'm fighting the Heartless now."
Kairi began to cry.
Riku pushed off his elbows and sat up, reaching blindly for her shoulder. "Hey, it's all right."
She pressed her face against his chest. "Everyone fights the Heartless… I can't do anything but…" Her words dissolved into sobs and she held him very close to her.
He knew what this meant, and it saddened him as well.
Sora wasn't here.
"Kairi, didn't you and Sora come home together?" he asked quietly.
"No," she nearly growled, her words muffled as she cried them into his shoulder. "He reached out for me, but he couldn't come to my side… He told me he'd come back—more than three years and he's not back!"
"Then he didn't live up to his promise," mused Riku.
"What?" she sniffed.
"It's nothing."
Take care of her…
Riku felt a little guilty somehow. All this time he had assumed Kairi, Sora, and all his friends were back on Destiny Islands living out happy lives. He had been selfishly worrying about his own troubles in Caelestis for so long.
And here she was, all alone.
"I'm sorry, Kairi. I'm sorry," he repeated, running his hand over her hair.
She drew back from him finally, her sobs dying down. "Riku… It's okay. What happened to you, anyway? After Ansem possessed you?"
"When Sora defeated Ansem, I was freed," he said. "I helped Sora shut the Door at Kingdom Hearts. But I was on the other side."
He could sense her tensing, feel her confusion and surprise as it rippled through the air.
"Where did you go?"
"I wandered for a while…and I came to a place it's best you don't know about it." He smiled at her sadly. "I lived in a city of darkness for a very long time. But then I found Avarielle."
"That woman?"
Riku thought the way she had spoken was rather strange. Almost accusing. Kairi?
"Yeah. Ava."
He was about to ask about the tone of her voice when something whipped past his face. It sounded almost like a blitzball.
"Hey!" called a deep, accented voice from down the beach as the object whipped around the other side of the silver-haired man's head.
"It's Wakka," Kairi told Riku and helped him to stand up. "Tidus and Selphie are with him."
Riku dusted himself off and took a deep breath. A few more old friends he'd only be able to hear. A few more people to be shocked and horrified by his clouded white eyes.
"Kairi, who ya talkin' ta?"
Kairi's happy notes sounded forced. "It's Riku! He's come back!"
A mob of ecstatic laughter neared him.
"Wow, you're so tall!"
"And all muscle!"
"Lookin' pretty white…heh heh."
Riku nodded toward the voices. "Hey."
He heard Selphie gasp, for those shrill notes could only belong to her.
"It's okay, you guys," he tried to assure them. "I'm fine otherwise." It was a bit of a white lie, but he knew that this group was pretty ignorant about the Heartless.
The laughter had died and the air turned stagnant.
"I told you I was fine," Riku insisted. "It's nothing."
"Glad to see ya back safe, brudda," Wakka said, slapping Riku on the back. "Missed ya."
"Oh, yeah!" Selphie chimed in. She gave him a quick hug. "You came back so handsome, too."
Riku mocked humility and rubbed the back of his head. "Thanks."
The girl giggled, returning to her normal peppy self. "Yeah!"
"Dude, I hope you can still blitz," said Tidus, taking Riku's hand and shaking it vigorously. "You were one of the best players."
"I'll try it sometime," Riku promised. "I can still hear that ball pretty good."
"Let's go grab some chow!" Tidus suggested.
"You just ate!" Selphie reminded him.
"I'm still hungry—OW!"
"Hee hee."
Kairi laughed. "I think breakfast is a good idea."
"Whoo-hoo!" Tidus screamed and ducked out of the way before Selphie could hit him again.
Riku had forgotten how good island food could be. He gorged himself on a mushroom omelet, plenty of fresh fruit, and even some fried fish. Of course, he could here Tidus and Wakka slurping and shoving next to him.
"Want some more coconut milk?" Kairi asked.
"Sure!" he said.
"Oh, Kairi, your cooking is waaaaayyy better than mine," whined the other girl.
"Yours is good," Tidus told Selphie between gulps.
"Hey! Don't talk with your mouth full! Disgusting!" she groaned. "Besides, you'll eat anything."
Riku just laughed, feeling around for his glass on the wooden table. He missed and sent the liquid spilling. "Sorry," he mumbled, feeling embarrassed, especially as Selphie and Tidus stopped their argument and a nervous quiet fell over everyone in the hut.
"Oh, that's okay," Kairi said quickly, reaching over to sop up the mess. "I'm all out of coconuts. I'll go get some more."
"I'll go with you," Riku offered, standing.
"Okay."
She took his forearm and they left the hut for the open air.
They waded in the water all the way around the island to the grove of coconut trees. It was dark and shady there. Riku was thankful. He loved being back home, but the hot summer sun was something he wasn't used to.
He realized that they were standing near where they had built their raft four years ago. He brought this up.
"Yeah…I guess that's right."
And Riku knew that, just like all those times during his childhood, Kairi's mind was only on Sora.
"Those three are so silly." She changed the subject as a nearby tree shook. He realized she must have hit it with a log; it was how they usually harvested coconuts. "Oh! Watch out!"
Something hit the ground right at his feet and Riku jumped back. He'd almost been knocked unconscious.
"They don't have an idea of the bigger picture," Kairi said from close nearby. "Would you take these?" She piled three large coconuts into his open arms.
"The bigger picture?"
"About the Heartless and everything."
Not even you can glimpse the bigger picture, Kairi. For that, you're lucky.
"Innocence suits children," he said.
"But we're all growing up…!"
"Don't be so quick to," Riku advised. "And don't chastise them for holding on to the days they have left."
He closed his eyes and pointed his face towards the breeze.
"Ava and I should leave this island soon."
"Riku…?"
"I don't want the Heartless to follow us here. They would spoil everything."
Coconuts tumbled to the ground as she ran and forced him to drop his load, throwing her arms around the man once more. "You can't leave me, Riku! Please stay here with me!"
It was so very tempting. Here she was, his childhood love begging him to stay…
"I'll come back, Kairi. And I'll bring Sora home with me."
Why had he made such a ridiculous promise?
"You will?"
Now he was bound to keep his word.
[End Act II]